Time to Put on a Show: 100 Doctor Who One Shots
by carlizzlerose
Summary: 100 Doctor Who one-shots based on 100 different title prompts. Enjoy!
1. 001  Beginnings

Prompt: Beginnings  
>Characters: 11th Doctor and Amy Pond (mentioned)<br>Mood: Hopeful  
>AN: This is my first fanfic, so go easy guys. I hope you enjoy the many more (I hope) to come!<p>

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><p>There was no color. There was no sound or structure, no emotions or form. There was no measure of time, if time existed here at all. There was no gravity, and no weightlessness, no ratio of mass or distance. The titles and names of... <em>somewhere<em>... had apparently fallen away. His memories seemed to have died, but how he wasn't sure.

_This feels an awful lot like thinking._ He thought, unsure of how the thought was even possible and what it meant, making him doubt that it was a tangible thought at all. But as soon as the thought formed in the nothingness, the words because true. And as if through some sort of crack in the universe, bit of him seemed to slip into place and he could think again.

The Doctor, he was called. His memories slowly returned to him. Who he was, why he was here. It all seemed to do with the crack. The crack in Amelia Pond's bedroom wall, the crack that had followed them into the Byzantium, the cracks throughout time and space that led him to the opening of the Pandorica, and eventually, the rebooting of the universe.

And then he could feel again. The force of emotion was so strong it would have knocked him off of his feet, if he had feet. Did he have feet? He didn't know, he couldn't see. He was still nothing more than a conscious mind, suddenly hit with a wave of sadness. Somewhere in some universe he used to be a part of, everyone he knew was still alive, graced with the new beginning he had given them, but ignorant to the favor. The last memory he retained was of him stepping into the crack, into his death. And suddenly, here he was.

"If this is what dying feels like, it's rubbish!" He yelled out, the sound disappearing as quick as it had appeared, nothing to bounce off of and travel back to him from. But then he could speak, and he could hear, and there was still nothing.

The words, however lost to living ears they may now be, still rung true in his mind. He never expected the experience of his end to be grand. He didn't think he deserved that. No, the most he thought he could hope for was that when the time came for him to go, it would feel... complete. But instead he felt more alive than he was comfortable with, more solid and structural than a man who had cheated death ten times could imagine death would feel. Which provoked the blissful thought: What if he wasn't dead?

"No, no, no, don't think like that," he chided himself, "You're dead, you died. It's over." He paused, every word he wanted to say caught up in the moments that weren't passing. "You _have_ to let them go."

He buried his burning hopes deep down into his core where their flames licked every emotion he couldn't let himself feel. He knew his last hope had been in vain the moment he stepped through the crack. Amelia Pond, extraordinary Amelia Pond, she would remember so much. She would bring back her parents and he childhood he'd so ruthlessly stolen from her. She would be able to live it now, live it right. Live without his interference. Because she wouldn't remember him. The memory of him would fade until it was no more than a dream, and with every moment she lived her life the **right** way, the harder the dream would be to remember.

And through all of that, _why_ would she remember a story told to her while she slept? Why would she hang onto a selfish old man's final attempt at self preservation?

Suddenly, everything was wrong. His mind disoriented and he felt like every bit of the reality he was clinging to was being pulled every which way. A sickening rush of nausea ran through him as, to his amazement, he realized he could move fingers and legs. He fell and before he could spring his arms out and react, his back and slammed down hard against a cold, hard surface.

He gasped for breath as it scuttled away from him. The landing had knocked the air right from his lungs and he lay on the ground for a moment, the terrible feeling of suffocation rattling through him. Once he had taken a few shaky breaths, he peeled his eyes open.

Immediately he closed them. It _couldn't _be. Not again. It must be his mind playing tricks on him. He _couldn't_ have actually survived. He opened them. What the _hell? _The barely coherent thoughts shot out of his mind like bullets in the dark, none finding any truth to pierce or clarity to draw out.

He repeated the process with his eyes so rapidly the vision blurred and the view of the TARDIS celling was nearly impossible to make out. He sat up, and as his disoriented body started to register the things around him, the console room spun and swayed. But as the voice of Amy Pond radiated into the blue box from whatever wedding setting lay the TARDIS doors, the Doctor's face broke into a grin.

She remembered.


	2. 002 Interlude

Prompt: Interlude  
>Characters: The Doctor and OC<br>Mood: Sweet :)  
>Season: 6 (After God Comlpex, before Closing Time)<p>

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><p>The Doctor ran through the TARDIS doors, bolting them shut behind his back with an over-the-shoulder sonicing. He sank to the ground in exhaustion, breathing deep, as the entire Roman army assembled outside of his box, ready to attempt to break the doors down and enter by force. They'd fail, of course, the defense barriers would see to that, but sitting here through it all was nerve-wracking enough. Picking himself up, he straightened his bow tie and started up the ramp toward the console.<p>

"Well, now that's that's all-" He shot a nervous glance over his should "...settled. Where to, Pon-" He started out of habit, cutting himself off before he could finish the sentence. It had been such a long time since he'd seen the Ponds, much longer than he liked to remember. But this wasn't the first time he'd made the mistake of thinking that in the adrenaline of his adventurous life, the TARDIS interior wasn't as empty as it really was.

The wonderful places he'd yet to see, sparkling in his mind just moments previous, began to dim and scatter as the weight settled down upon him once more. He was alone. And not the alone he had known before, losing Rose, losing Donna, saying goodbye to Martha. Real loneliness. He was never again going to show someone the stars, to see the look on their face when they saw the inside of the TARDIS for the first time and hear the amazed "Its bigger on the inside!" He could, but we wouldn't. Because now he had a deadline. And he wasn't going to spend his final days ruining another person's life by dragging them along as he ran.

"Oh, I am too old." He mused, running his fingers through the still youthful hair. "I'm just an old man trying so hard to be young again. And now..." He let out a shaky laugh. "And now I'm dying."

_But I'm not dead yet._ He abjured, the more optimistic thought breaking through the hazy overlay of misery that was setting down. He fiddled with the controls on the console. What he needed was a distraction. A big distraction.

"And what is more distracting," He said, the TARDIS now starting to rattle and shake, his voice picking up volume as the loud vworping sound filled the empty air, "...than light, sound, color," He grinned as he pulled the last lever, "...and America?"

He peered a look at the scanner for a moment as it confirmed his location. Smiling, he did a little spin down the ramp, grabbed his green coat off the rack and was out the door.

In front of him was a long stretch of grass the size of a football field. covered by blanked and baskets of food, and most importantly, hundreds of people.

"The fourth of July," He marveled, looking around at the people gathered on the grass waiting for the fireworks to begin. "American independence day. All of these people come together and wait for hours to watch other people fire big balls of light into the sky. What better distraction than th-" The Doctor started as he felt a tug on his coat.

He look down, surprised, and saw a small girl, no older than five or six. She griped the corner of his coat and looked up at him curiously, her dark bangs falling over her big blue eyes. He bent down to her level.

"Hello there!" He smiled at her. She grinned back, showing both incomplete rows of teeth in a smile so big it was almost a grimace. He laughed. "What's your name?"

"Poppy." She spoke without fear or hesitation, letting go of the hem of his coat.

"Poppy, that's a lovely name. I'm the Doctor."

"Thanks. Mommy says it's a flower, but it just makes me think of popcorn." She looked thoughtful for a moment, and then continued. "Were you talking to yourself?" She asked him curiously.

"As a matter of fact, Poppy, I was."

"Don't you have someone else to talk to?" Her eyebrows knit together sadly. He let out a sigh at her words, shaking his head.

"Not today... no. Not for a while now." He smiled at her, seeing the pitying expression on her young features and jumping back up to his full height. "But that's alright. I've got my own ears to listen, and I've got my box. I keep entertained. For example, I've got these fireworks to look forward to! And I've got..." He trailed off. Poppy looked up at him, sadness shining in her wide eyes.

'Enjoying the show, Poppy?" His fingers weaved in and out, a nervous tendency he'd picked up rather recently. Poppy looked at him with big eyes, looked at his hands, and then looked back up to his curious expression.

"Are you afraid, Doctor?"

He looked down at her, the curiosity quickly fading into a reserved surprise, "Hm? Afraid of what?" He posed cautiously.

Poppy avoided his eyes and stared shyly down at the grass beneath her feet. "I don't know, you just look scared of something."

He contemplated the answer for a moment. He knew what the truthful answer would be. Yes, of course he was scared. Not just that, he was terrified. More terrified than he'd been in his however many hundreds of years in this universe. And that was why he darted from planet to planet, from past to future. But this innocent young child, a girl that reminded him so much of little Amelia Pond in her fearless tone of voice, her insightful analysis of his face over his words. How could he admit how frightened he was? How could he let her down?

"Mommy says not to run when you're scared." Poppy continued thoughtfully. The Doctor stared at her, his eyes widening and his hearts pounding in his ears. He swallowed and let out a single breath of a laugh.

"Then your Mum would be very wise." He smiled sadly, thinking of when he'd last given that advice. His eyes found the grass and planted themselves there, not finding it in themselves to meet Poppy's glance.

All was silent for a moment, and the Doctor assumed she was waiting for more of a response from him. When no such response was given, she tapped him lightly. He looked up, meeting her worried glance.

"Don't run, Doctor." She smiled, encouraging a smile out of him as well. When she was greeted with a light smile on his lips, she broke into a grin.

"You are right, Poppy. I can't run anymore. I've run for far too long." He leaned down one last time and looked her in the eyes. "Thank you. You're brilliant, you know." Then, he picked himself up and started back towards his box.

He didn't look back as he closed the door behind him. Perhaps he owed it to her to say his goodbyes after what she'd done for him, even if it was just in that last fleeting glance, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He couldn't encourage the curiosity about the mysterious man with the disappearing blue box. He would not ruin another childhood.

She would not be another Amelia.


End file.
